The Instructional Academic Staff (IAS) Task Force was appointed by the Executive
Committee of the UWL Faculty Senate in October, 2004 to investigate and make
recommendations about instructional academic staff concerns regarding contracts
and other employment and representational issues.

In addition to Faculty Senate, recommendations to attend to academic staff
concerns have been made by both system and UWL groups. In the fall of 2000
UW-System created an Instructional Academic Staff (IRAS) Working Group to
investigate and recommend titling options for non-tenure track instructional and
research staff and to propose initiatives to facilitate the integration if IRAS
into institutional life. The UW System Sloan Project for Academic Career
Advancement pursued the recommendations of the IRAS Working Group and supported
the recommendations to better address IAS concerns. Here on campus, the
Women’s Advisory Council also recommended that UWL better attend to academic
staff concerns. Given the majority of academic staff are women, addressing
these concerns also addresses gender equity concerns. Finally, UWL
academic staff brought concerns about employment issues to Faculty Senate. Five
procedures exist to add an item to the Faculty Senate agenda: 1) Senate
Executive Committee action, 2) action by the Chancellor of the University, 3)
faculty committee action, 4) one third vote of senators present and voting at a
meeting, and 5) a petition signed by no fewer than 10 faculty members.
Essentially, the only option open to the academic staff was a petition
requesting Faculty Senate address the academic staff concerns.
Anecdotally, many academic staff were reluctant to sign the petition for fear of
negative retribution from their departments, programs, or the institution.

Task Force Activities and
Background Information

Our investigation consisted of several activities including: 1) a survey of all
UWL academic staff, instructional and non-instructional,[1]
2) reviews of policies and procedures at UWL and other UW System schools, 3)
consultation with the chairs of Faculty Senate and the Academic Staff Council,
and 4) consultation with the Chancellor, the Provost, Academic Deans, and the
Director of Human Resources.

IAS are a valuable resource at UWL. In fall 2003, IAS taught 28% of
courses at UWL, up from 21% in 1994 (UW System Sloan Project Fact Sheet:
Faculty & Staff vs. Student Enrollment Trends – UW-La Crosse). IAS
perform numerous duties in addition to teaching. Only 16% of the IAS who
responded to our survey reported their department expects them to teach as their
only duty. Of those, 75% hold single-semester contracts. Individuals
with at least one-year contracts are expected by their departments to engage in
anywhere from one to 15 other activities (median = 4). The most common
responsibilities include serving on departmental committees, advising,
coordinating a course, and serving on college committees.

While IAS value teaching and working with students, clearly morale about other
conditions of their employment, such as job security, is quite low. This
is compounded by the fact that IAS are not kept in an electronic database by HR
beyond the current academic year, so there is no easy way to determine length of
UWL employment for any IAS. As one former IAS stated, “It’s as if the
contributions I made in the 6 years I was IAS aren’t valued. I only began being
‘counted’ once I became a tenure-track faculty”.

b.At least two
additional seats, designated to be filled by IAS, are added to Faculty Senate.

c.A Faculty Senate
committee is created to represent IAS. Specifically, the committee would
consider and recommend policies affecting the academic staff status, salary,
appointment types, titling, career progression, and working conditions. It also
would consider and recommend the practices and procedures for implementing those
policies. Finally the committee would be responsible for monitoring HR
progress in collecting and disseminating information on these policies and
procedures.

a.UWL outline specific
policies for titling and career progression of IAS.

b.Actual practices
reflect these policies.

4.Review of
Academic Staff.

a.University policy
about the performance reviews of IAS are more specific and consistent with the
expected responsibilities of academic staff, and clearly communicated by HR.

b.All academic staff
are reviewed yearly to assure their classification as instructional or
non-instructional remains appropriate.

5.Communication.

a.An IAS web page with
links to resources both within and outside of UWL is created.

b.A mentorship program
for new IAS is institutionalized.

c.An IAS Faculty
Senate committee serves as a resource and advocate for IAS, and as a source of
feedback for HR in its efforts to improve communication.

6.Workload.

a.The teaching load
for full time IAS remains at the current level.

Discussion of
Recommendations

Governance. The
governance of IAS is inadequate. The current policy is that academic staff
without faculty status are governed by Academic Staff Council, while those with
faculty status are governed by Faculty Senate. Academic staff achieve
faculty status after they have held a .50 or greater teaching appointment for
three semesters. Interestingly, our survey of the academics staff found
that 69% of IAS were unaware of this policy. The policy is confusing and
often misunderstood for IAS and their departments. We also asked
respondents to rate the appropriateness of the current policy about governance
of academic staff on a scale from 1 (totally appropriate) to 7 (not at all
appropriate). Of the IAS who responded to our survey, most rated the
current policy as “not appropriate” (M = 4.36, SD = 1.55).

Our investigation of other UW System schools suggests that UWL is unique in the
policy of having IAS represented by two different governing bodies. Of the
IAS who responded to our survey only
16% indicated they would prefer to be governed by Academic Staff Council.
The remaining 84% were equally divided between Faculty Senate (44%) and “no
preference” (40%). Additionally, most IAS do not feel well represented by
their current governance group, regardless of whether they are governed by
Faculty Senate or Academic Staff Council.

The Task Force recommends that IAS be governed by Faculty Senate, regardless of
faculty status, although, only those IAS with faculty status would be allowed to
serve on Faculty Senate. Additionally, we recommend structural changes in
Faculty Senate to add at least two specified seats for IAS. Finally, we
recommend the creation of a Faculty Senate committee to represent IAS concerns.
This committee could continue work on other recommendations made in this report,
as well as serve as a resource for IAS in the future. Specific
responsibilities would include 1)
considering and recommending policies affecting the academic staff status,
salary, appointment types, titling, career progression, and working conditions,
2) considering and recommending the practices and procedures for implementing
those policies, and 3) monitoring HR progress in collecting and disseminating
information on these policies and procedures.

Contracts.
Clearly, a primary concern of IAS is job security. The replacement of
rolling-horizon contracts with, in many cases, single-year fixed-term contracts
has exacerbated this concern. About 31% of IAS who responded to our survey
have held rolling horizon contracts in the past. Currently, 54% hold
single-year fixed-term contracts and 26% have single-semester fixed-term
contracts. The remaining 20% have two- or three-year fixed-term contracts.
These short term contracts do not reflect actual length of employment.
Only about 7% of IAS who responded to our survey have worked at UWL for one year
or less. Over 75% have worked at UWL for more than three years (median = 8
years). The large majority (86%) have been continuously employed.
Additionally, the “not intended for renewal” clause in all fixed-term contracts
further aggravates not only job security concerns, but morale as well.
Again, given IAS generally are employed for many consecutive years, the contract
wording does not reflect current employment practices.

The Task Force recommends that contracts better reflect current practice.
Whenever possible, IAS should be offered multi-year fixed-term contracts and
renewable fixed-term contracts according to UWL Policies and Procedures, Chapter
10, Academic Staff Appointments and the UW System report “Teaching Academic
Staff In the UW System (A UW System Board of Regents 21st Century Study)”.[2]
Recommendation #5 states that institutions “review the longevity of the
instructional academic staff as a basis for planning and to ascertain the extent
to which IAS may be given extended appointments.” Recommendation #6 states that
institutions “consider, after the first year or two of appointment, making
renewable appointments for positions that can be supported by the budget and
programmatic needs. Fixed-term-terminal and one-semester appointments
should not be used repeatedly in the absence of a plan that demonstrates such
need.”

Furthermore, renewable appointments would eliminate the “not intended for
renewal” clause in contracts. Other UW System schools choose to avoid the
disingenuous practice of continual employment with fixed-term non-renewable
contracts by using fixed-term renewable contracts. For example, in Madison,
the policy is to give fixed-term renewable contracts to any individual
continuously employed in the same department for three straight years as the
longevity of the appointment demonstrates a need for that person’s skills in the
department. Of course, these contracts can be non-renewed if circumstances
change.

Further, we are concerned about the inconsistency in contracts across campus.
One IAS reported teaching four 3-credit courses in one semester and being paid
on a per-course basis, while other departments within the same college have IAS
with the same workload being paid the much higher full-time academic staff
salary. The capricious nature of these contracts in terms of both length
and compensation is inherently unfair. Employment conditions should not be
a function of the generosity of the department chair or dean. It is the
committee’s recommendation that HR be more responsible for ensuring compliance
with a set of fair standards to be consistently applied throughout the
University.

Titling and Career
Progression .
Many IAS are worried about the lack of advancement/career progression
opportunities at UWL. Titling and career progression has been studied by a
minimum of three different committees in the past 5-6 years with no action
taken. Most recently, in September, 2004, the College of Science and
Allied Health Instructional Academic Staff Task Force completed a report and
made recommendations about IAS titling and career progression. The report
noted that UWL is atypical amongst other UW System schools in its lack of use of
titling and career progression opportunities for academic staff. While UWL
has not disallowed the use of different titles for IAS, current practice does
not include the use of such titling and procedures about applying for career
progression in titles are unclear. When asked about career progression,
the Director of HR reported in an email to a member of this Task Force that the
IAS do not have career progression processes outlined, like the
non-instructional academic staff do, although there is one senior lecturer at
UWL. (The Task Force is also aware that one IAS holds the title of
Distinguished Lecturer as well). The email further defines what would qualify
someone as a senior lecturer, including extensive teaching experience and
extensive subject matter expertise.

The Task Force recommends that procedures for the career progression of academic
staff be delineated. The SAH Academic Staff Task Force specified
procedures in their report to the college, and the college identified
institutionalizing those procedures as a goal for the 2004-2005 academic year.
These procedures could easily be adopted by the other colleges and applied to
all academic staff to reduce the unfairness inherent in different compensation
and contract policies by college. We recommend that the procedures for career
progression of academic staff be included in UWL Policies and Procedures
Academic Staff Personnel Rules and clearly communicated to not only IAS, but UWL
department chairs and deans as well.

Communication about Policies and Procedures.
There appears to be no reliable resource for IAS to get employment information.
Anecdotally, both faculty and IAS have reported receiving inconsistent and
confusing answers from HR. Specifically, IAS have expressed confusion
about many policies and practices at UWL including, but not limited to contract
types, contract wording, titling/career progression options, merit review
procedures, retirement and healthcare benefits, and grievance procedures.
In addition, a review of other UW System schools web sites suggests that UWL’s
HR Department is in great need of improving how it communicates policies and
procedures pertaining to IAS. The miscommunication extends beyond HR.
Even as the Task Force investigated the concerns of IAS, we received different
answers to questions from the Chancellor, the Provost, and the Academic Deans.
We are in no way suggesting these inconsistent answers are intentional.
Rather, given the complexity of various policies, without one comprehensive
source, clear information is difficult to obtain.

The Task Force recommends better coordination and communication of information
affecting IAS. The UW System report “Teaching Academic Staff In the UW
System (A UW System Board of Regents 21st Century Study)”, mentioned above, also
recommends that institutions “identify personnel policies and practices that
apply to instructional academic staff in a way that makes them easily accessible
to department chairs, faculty, and instructional academic staff (Recommendation
#9) and “orient department chairs to their role as supervisors of
instructional…academic staff so they can implement academic staff employment
policies in a consistent matter (Recommendation #11). We support both of
these recommendations and believe they are the responsibility of HR. We
recommend that HR be held accountable for addressing these recommendations.

Further, we recommend HR create an IAS web page with resources for IAS, both
within and outside of the university. This is in accordance with the “UW
System Integration of Academic Staff Report” completed on 2000 regarding
recommendations to improve integration of IAS.[3]
Specifically the report suggests that institutions “develop or enhance a
webpage that includes information specific and relevant to IAS. The webpage
should be promoted widely across” the institution.In reviewing
various UW System school web pages, the Task Force was especially impressed with
the web pages at Oshkosh, Platteville, and Madison. We would encourage
these web pages be used as models for any revisions of the UWL web page.
Additionally, if an IAS Faculty Senate committee is created, this body could
serve as a source of information for IAS. Finally, we recommend that, also in
accordance with the UW System 2000 report, a mentorship program for new IAS be
institutionalized. Ideally, mentors should be other IAS rather than
non-instructional academic staff or faculty.

Review of Academic Staff.
Our investigation revealed two distinct areas of concern about the review of
academic staff. First, our survey of IAS suggested that performance review
practices of IAS vary widely among departments and programs. According to
the Academic Staff Employment Policies and Procedures, IAS “shall be annually
evaluated in accordance with Faculty Personnel Rules, UWS 3.05 and UWL 3.05”.
Given the premise that IAS have different responsibilities than faculty, these
review procedures quite likely are inappropriate in many cases. Anecdotal
reports do suggest that some IAS are subjected to identical review procedures
and expectations for faculty, yet they do not receive the tenure and
compensation benefits.In other cases, IAS are reviewed by different
departmental constituents several times within a single semester or single year.

Second, at an institutional level, the appropriate classification of academic
staff as instructional or non-instructional rarely is reviewed.
Specifically, some individuals are hired as non-instructional academic staff.
During the course of their employment, however, they have begun to teach classes
as part of their workload and regularly teach more than one class. These
individuals feel especially disenfranchised as teaching non-instructional
academic staff.

The Task Force recommends that specific, unique, and consistent procedures for
the performance review of IAS be specified, included in the Academic Staff
Employment Policies and Procedures, and clearly communicated by HR to IAS,
chairs, and deans. Additionally, we recommend that all academic staff
reviews, both instructional and non-instructional, include a review of the
classification title. Academic staff who teach courses as a regular part
of their workload should be classified as instructional academic staff.

Workload.
As previously noted, the large majority of IAS do much more than just teach.
In the majority of cases, departments expect academic staff to serve on
departmental committees and advise students. A substantial minority of
departments expects IAS to serve on college, university or search and screen
committees; coordinate courses; chair committees; and supervise undergraduate
clinicals, internships, practica, etc. As with faculty, these activities
are not included as an individual’s load.

While the Task Force recognizes the increased demands on all UWL employees, we
are concerned about the potential institutionalized increase in IAS teaching
loads. In general, we recommend that IAS teaching loads remain at current
levels. Any discussions of increased teaching loads for academic staff
must be mindful that, currently, IAS do much more than simply teach. If
IAS teaching loads are increased, they should be accompanied by commensurate
decreases in other responsibilities.

[1]
Brief descriptions of some results are summarized in the current report.
For full results, please refer to supplementary materials.